Dean Vs The Tainted Tomatoes
by StrigoiVii
Summary: Sometimes Dean should really pay more attention to what he puts in his mouth. Co-written by my good friend Live1970 really pretty much written entirely by her but she was too lazy to make her own acct to post it. Sick!Dean No surprise there, right?


_A/N: This story was pretty much written entirely by my good friend Live1970, I just tweaked it here and there a little. She wrote it for me to cheer me up and for that, I appreciate her immensely! This is her first attempt at fanfiction so I say "Bravo" to her a million times over!! I hope you enjoy her little trip into the sick!Dean world as much as I did._

Dean Vs. The Tainted Tomato

Thursday April 10th, 2008

Sam flopped down onto his own bed, staring at the curled up form of his older brother finally sleeping soundly in the other one right next to his. It was the first time Dean had slept for more than an hour at a time for nearly two days now which meant it was the first time Sam would get to sleep for more than an hour at a time also and god knew he was tired enough to sleep for the next couple days if everyone would leave him alone long enough to let him. Well, everyone being Dean that is, since he was the only one that would really care where he was or what he was doing. If only they hadn't stopped at that nasty little diner just outside of Toledo. If only Dean hadn't insisted on ordering the Taco Burger with extra salsa. If only they'd come through a day later, after all the tomatoes in town had been recalled. If only Dean didn't have a little over a month left on his deal and he was now spending one of the last few weeks of it either trapped on the toilet, over the toilet, or curled up into a tiny, little ball on his bed practically crying in pain or delirious from the ridiculously high fever he had spiked that had finally broken just hours before. If only they weren't Winchesters. Life really sucked, didn't it? Stretching out on his bed and laying there in the dark listening to his brother actually snore for the first time in nearly a week, he let his mind drift off into the land of the sandman, the events of the last few days finally taking their toll on him and dragging him off to sleep.

Tuesday April 8th, 2008

"Stop there Sam," Dean pointed and shouted when he saw the giant neon sign brightly displaying the name "Joe's Diner" and the other sign right below it proudly informing its customers that Joe's was "OPEN 24/7 365". "I'm starving and it's almost lunchtime."

"Come on Dean, we don't have that far to go. We can eat when we get there."

"Dude, we've got another two hours until we hit Toledo and I really wanna kill that bitch on a full stomach."

"We don't even know if she's going to be there Dean. You heard Bobby; he said it was a tip from an unreliable source. He didn't know for sure if Bela would be there but since we weren't that far from Toledo, he thought we should at least check it out."

"So why do we need to check it out on an empty stomach? Just pull over man, I promise I'll eat fast."

"Dean, one of these days your stomach is going to be the de…" he started to say then cut himself off, realizing that one of these days may very well never come. "Fine, just eat fast."

Sam pulled the Impala into a parking spot right in front of the large picture window facing the road and killed the engine, throwing the keys at his brother after he pulled them out of the ignition and scowling at him. "You're driving the rest of the way since stopping was your brilliant idea."

"Fine by me," Dean shoved the keys into his pocket when Sam got out and he quickly followed him inside.

Sam couldn't help but curl his nose up at the sight and smells inside the 'diner', and he used that term loosely. His feet stuck to the floor as he walked and the smell of grease and onions was nearly overwhelming his sense of smell. Dean was not as put off by the lack of cleanliness of the place and strolled right past his brother without a second thought, grabbing the first booth he found and plopping himself down on it. Sam did the same and cringed when he touched the menu that was sitting in the holder on the table, the slimy, greasy feeling against his fingers pretty much ensuring him that he had no intentions of eating anything this place had to offer.

"Whatcha gonna have Sammy?"

"A shot of penicillin when we leave. Man, this place is disgusting."

"Come on, it's not that bad. We've eaten in worse," Dean defended his choice of eating establishments.

"Not by choice," Sam replied as if reading his brother's mind.

"What can I get you two fellas?" The waitress that had approached the table totally unnoticed by either 

hunter asked and without hesitating, Dean placed his order.

"I'll have the taco burger and could you load it up with extra salsa, sauce, and onions?"

"Sure thing. What about you?" She asked, pointing her pencil at Sam.

"Nothing, thanks."

"Sam, if I'm driving when we leave here, I'm not stopping anywhere else. If you don't eat now, you won't eat at all," Dean said to him, sounding more like a father talking to an obstinate child then the brother he was.

"Guess that's just my tough luck then, isn't it?"

"Don't come crying to me later when your stomach is growling little brother," Dean shrugged, indicating to the waitress that their order was complete and she just walked silently away.

Dean was a man of his word and within fifteen minutes he had been served his food, inhaled most of it off the plate, paid and left as promised. Back on the road, he relaxed himself into the driver's seat of the car and drove the rest of the way to Toledo in satisfied silence. It was nearly six in the evening when they arrived at their destination and much to their disappointment, the tip Bobby had received ended up being exactly what they had thought it would be, bogus. After hours of wild goose chasing, they decided to just hole up for the night instead of heading back to Bobby's. Considering how tired they both were, they checked into the cleanest but cheapest motel they could find and hunkered down for the night.

It was the restless fidgeting at a little after three a.m. that started to wake Sam up first, each movement his brother made across the room being made with a pained grunt to go along with it. He was still half asleep when the cursing and the slamming of the bathroom door startled him to full awareness. He climbed from his own bed and rested his ear against the shut door, trying to hear what may be going on behind it. The few sounds he heard were enough to make him gently knock instead of just opening the door because he really didn't want to barge in and see his brother sitting on the hard toilet seat expelling what sounded like every ounce of bodily fluids he had stored up inside him. He knocked again a little more forcefully when the first try went unanswered but knew he would have to open the door when the long, pained moan echoed from behind the closed door.

"Dean, are you ok?" He asked tentatively as he cracked the door open enough to peer inside with one eye and what he saw was definitely not ok.

Dean sat hunched over on the toilet with his arms wrapped around his stomach. His head was turned to the side and his flushed cheek was resting heavily on his own knee. Covered in sweat, he didn't respond to Sam's question as he sat there shivering, the occasional moan he let out being the only sound he seemed to be able to make. Without hesitation, Sam entered the bathroom; half expecting his brother to protest and complain about Sam being way too far into his personal space but when he laid a hand on Dean's shoulder, complaints about Sam's presence was the last thing the younger brother heard.

"Sam," Dean groaned from his bent position and Sam knelt down to get closer to his brother's face, the whisper his name came out in barely making it to his ears. "I think I'm gonna puke."

Sam watched his brother's back start to clench and convulse and he had barely enough time to grab the trash can next to the toilet Dean was sitting on to spread his brother's legs, shove it between his feet on the floor and turn his face to it before he started launching bodily fluids from the other end instead. All Sam could do was rest his hand on Dean's back to hold him up and wait for the violent vomiting to turn into just heaving, then back into shivering again. Once he had let loose everything he had stored up inside and had gone quiet, Sam decided it was time to get his brother off the toilet and back into his bed, pretty sure it was going to be a very long night. One small problem seemed to make itself known pretty quickly though. Dean was definitely not going to be cleaning himself up considering he couldn't even pick his head up off his own knees and Sam held his breath and grimaced as he went about that unpleasant task.

"You are so gonna owe me big for this, Dean," he grumbled when he was finally done and without bothering to drag his brother's boxers back up, he instead pulled them from off his feet and threw them into the bathroom corner.

Wrapping his arms around his brother's chest, Sam picked Dean up as gently as he could and carried him back to the bed. Every step he took with Dean in his arms seemed bring out another groan until he was resting back on the bed again and Sam only half covered him with the scratchy motel blanket when he noticed how hot Dean's body had become. Dragging out the first aid kit from Dean's bag and turning to his brother who had now curled himself up into a tight little ball, he tried shaking Dean awake enough for him to open his mouth.

"I need to take your temp Dean; you need to open your mouth," Sam spoke softly, trying to keep himself 

calm.

"I'm ok Sam, just leave me alone and let me sleep," Dean finally spoke something other than moaning and groaning and Sam was actually relieved that he was somewhat coherent.

"Sorry man, can't do that," Sam said back and forced the thermometer into his brother's mouth when he wouldn't open it himself and waited for the beeping to announce its reading was complete. "Hmm, 101. Ok, not too bad. How do you feel?"

'It hurts Sam," he told him, reverting back to the moaning again.

"What hurts, your stomach?" Sam asked, already knowing what the answer to that question would be. All Dean did was shake his head yes and Sam wasn't the least bit surprised. "Anything else?"

"My head too," he moaned out again and before Sam could register what was happening, Dean had nearly jumped from the bed and sprinted the short distance back into the bathroom again, not bothering to even close the door behind him this time.

Sam's face crinkled up in a scowl when he heard what he thought was totally impossible replaying itself. He was convinced that Dean couldn't possibly have anything still in his stomach or intestines left to donate to the septic system but he had been wrong. He waited for a few agonizing minutes before peeking into the bathroom again and found exactly what he expected to find. Dean was sitting in the exact same position he had been in the first time he found him, only this time he was rocking himself as he clutched his stomach, the tears that were streaming down his face unable to go unnoticed.

"Sam," he called out, oblivious that his brother was already standing next to him. "Help me into the shower, please."

"Dean, you can't even stand up straight. How the hell are you planning on taking a shower?"

"I have to Sam. I'm not having you wipe my ass again," he remarked, a little more coherently then he had been over the last hour or so. "Besides, I feel better already."

"Sure you do," Sam huffed, but did has his brother requested and turned on the hot water and waited for it to warm before turning on the cold to tone the temperature down a bit. "You need help getting in?"

"No, I got it," Dean said and made a tremendous effort to stand, his body already naked since Sam had stripped him of the only piece of apparel he had been wearing. He gingerly stepped into the tub and drew back the curtain as Sam stood guard at the door listening for anything that may sound like trouble but breathed a sigh of relief when Dean finally shut the water off after a good ten minutes. Pulling the curtain back, he nearly fell over when he reached for a towel and when Sam caught his wet body in his arms, all Dean could do was fall limply into them. "I'm sorry Sammy,"

"Sorry for what?"

"Sorry for getting you all wet," Dean mumbled as he passed out in his brother's grasp.

Sam carried him still wet back to the bed, concerned that his body was starting to heat up and wondering if it had only been the shower that caused it. Resting Dean back onto the bed and forcing the thermometer back into his mouth, he realized is suspicions had been right. Reading the numbers on the display, he clearly saw that his brother's body temperature was rising quickly not that it had jumped up to over 102. Turning Dean onto his back, he grabbed a plastic cup from the counter and filled it with the coldest water that would come from the tap then grabbed the bottle of ibuprofen from the still open kit on the floor. Sitting Dean up slightly and forcing pillows behind his back to help prop him up, he tried shaking him awake.

"Hey, Dean. Wake up man. You need to drink something and I need you to take some Tylenol for me."

"Can't," he choked out, already establishing his defiance.

"Yes you can and you will. I don't want to have to take you to the ER man, ok?"

"Fine, but they're gonna end up in the toilet as soon as I swallow them anyway," he told Sam and Sam figured he was probably right but he had to try.

Dean did as his brother had asked and took the two tablets one after another with the minutest amounts of water he could swallow, the cold liquid hitting his stomach already making it start to clench all over again. With the willpower of a saint, Dean somehow forced his stomach to calm at least long enough for the pills he had just swallowed to dissolve as Sam sat next to him watching and Dean made it all of about twenty minutes before the water he had ingested made its way right back out the way it had come. The pain medication he had taken seemed to have been absorbed enough to help ease his headache and cramps and it didn't take very long for Dean to drift off to sleep under Sam's watchful eye.

With his nerves shot and his mind reeling keeping him wide awake, he just turned on the TV and started flipping through channels. At nearly six in the morning, there really was nothing to watch other than .local news so Sam decided to at least catch up with the outside world. He was half listening to the broadcast 

and half listening to his brother's breathing until something caught his attention and he trained all his focus on the TV. Flipping the TV off when the story was done now that he was worried and annoyed all at the same time, he just muttered under his breath when he saw Dean once again shoot like a bullet into the bathroom with no sounds of warning ever made.

"Tomatoes. How do you get salmonella from fuckin' tomatoes?"

Following Dean into the bathroom, he felt like he was watching the same movie over and over again like it was stuck on some crazy time loop. Dean seemed to have a little routine going and after another half hour of just mainly sitting and cramping now that he was pretty much running on empty, Sam seemed to be able to drag him back into his bed. For hours this went on over the course of the entire day, Dean never going more than an hour or two without finding himself in the bathroom for one reason or another, the urge there but having nothing to expel only seeming to make things worse. Sam couldn't get him to drink anything but had at least convinced him to suck on the ice he had gotten from the machine outside that he crushed with the butt end of Dean's gun, knowing he had to keep him hydrated somehow. As the day dragged on into the night, Dean's fever rose higher and higher until Sam had to force another dose of Tylenol down him, his refusal at putting anything in his mouth other then Sam's ice chips bordering on dangerous. Amazingly, he kept not only the pills but the water he had swallowed them with in his stomach for nearly an hour, the meds only succeeding in easing his discomfort but really doing nothing more. Sam was alarmed to see that Dean's temperature was still hovering at a little over 103, even after the Tylenol had to have fully been absorbed by now and he seriously considered doubling the dosage when Dean started mumbling incoherently.

"No, I still have a month left… leave me alone…"

"Hey, Dean, wake up," Sam tried jarring him back to awareness.

"Sammy, that you?" He continued his mumbling as his glassy eyes met Sam's and for a minute, he actually looked scared. "Don't let them take me Sam."

"Don't let who take you Dean?"

"The hell hounds... don't let them take me Sammy, please," Dean moaned, not from physical pain this time but quite obviously from a different sort of agony.

"Dean…"

"Please Sammy, don't let them take me. I don't want to go to hell," Dean was nearly begging now. "You have to help me Sam, you're all I've got and I can't leave you alone. I love you little brother.'

"I know, I love you too man and I'm going to do everything in my power to not let that happen Dean, I promise," Sam said as calmly as he possibly could, the knowledge of what was going through Dean's fevered head not overly startling to him.

"I know, but I …" he started to say but was cut off by his own stomach this time as it started to spasm and he couldn't hold in the pained cry now that he was totally drained. "Oh god, not again."

Sam gently rolled him onto his side and let him heave; pretty sure that nothing would come up with each convulsion and when he was finally through Sam was at least glad to see he had been right. When the episode finally passed, Sam went with his earlier instincts and forced Dean to take a couple more Tylenol and sat back and waited for them to finally kick in, which they actually did after a long while, the fever slowly dropping from the high one hundreds to the low over the course of the next few hours. Sam was right there by his brother's side with a cold washcloth to drape over his head and he wiped away the sweat from his shaking chest, the chills starting slowly as the fever gradually went down but becoming more and more severe as the night went on.

By morning, Dean's temperature read just over 100, his body had finally calmed and Sam had gotten him to keep down a full glass of water and more pills. His shivering had nearly ceased and he was starting to actually think clearly when he came back to the bed from the bathroom with another cold, wet rag to press against his skull.

"Hey, you with me again?" Sam asked when he saw the bloodshot green eyes that were staring at him from under the washcloth held some coherence in them.

"Yeah, I think so," he answered with a slight slur.

"How do you feel?"

"Like I went ten rounds with Mike Tyson and lost. What the hell happened?"

"Rotten tomatoes. You got some rotten tomatoes dude. It's all over the news, they recalled them this morning."

"Well, lucky me to get the last batch of them then, eh?"

"Hey, you were the one that wanted extra salsa," Sam snarked, needing to get that one, innocent dig in. 

"Seriously, how do you feel?"

"Better, just really really tired, that's all. What about you? You look like crap Sam, have you slept?" Dean voiced his own concern about his little brother's well being now that he wasn't stuck behind a fevered haze anymore.

"Not since Tuesday," Sam answered through clearly bloodshot eyes.

"Sorry.'

"It's ok, just tell me you're finally gonna get some real sleep so I can too."

"Sounds like a plan. Listen Sam, the next time I ask to stop for food, do me a favor, will ya?"

"What?" Sam asked, his curiosity peaked.

"Just keep driving, ok?"


End file.
